Outside the law

Apropos of Barkha Dutt’s article Close encounters..

Apropos of Barkha Dutt’s article Close encounters(April 28), no one has the right to engage in moral policing though, to some extent, journalists can border on the voyeuristic. The dust is yet to settle on the police action in Delhi. Let us not muddy the waters. The police have every right to investigate the matter and no one should sit on judgment on them.

PR Sinhavia e-mail

II

When Pota was removed, many liberals celebrated. But a security officer is now more compelled than ever to consider fake encounters if the risk he/she is taking in saving society is to be made worthwhile. If the government had allowed killing of the terrorists bartered for in Kandahar, we would not have had to confront that situation so shamefully.

Kshitiz GuptaUSA

III

It is unfortunate that the deeds of a few army and police officers have undone the sacrifices of thousands of our men in uniform, who have been battling terrorism at personal risk. Not all the encounters are fake as is being sought to be projected by the writer. Those who try to blacken the name of the entire fraternity in uniform should spend a few days with them. They will find what it is to face a highly indoctrinated group of people armed with weapons.

RJ KhuranaBhopal

IV

The stage-managed surrenders, confessions and encounter killings are the only methods that our police prefer. The force is getting more politicised by the day. The argument that normal rules and laws often fail to handle serious crime situations is only a reflection on the inefficiency of our police functioning. By taking unlawful routes to handle crimes, the police are subverting the entire judicial system and eroding the faith of people in lawful governance. If criminals are to be treated with brutal force, how are we different from medieval societies that believed in the dictum ‘an eye for an eye’?

Ved GulianiHissar

V

Killing Sheikh Sohrabuddin in a fake encounter was an illegal act. But whenever a Muslim becomes a victim in such police activities in Gujarat, the secularists start sympathising with the community, forgetting the inhuman crimes committed by them. Who can forget the 9/11 attacks in the US, not to speak of several terrorist attacks on Hindu shrines in India. It is said that extra-judicial killings provide fertile ground for terrorism to flourish. But the reverse is also true, though Manoj Joshi does not think so.